Herbie-sitting: a World of Feces

Heather and I are dog-sitting Katie and Lee’s Herbie (or Herbie’s Katie and Lee, depending on your perspective on who “owns” who in human-dog relationships). So far so good. The only down-side is that Herbie’s a double-dumper: two shits a walk. It either means you burn through plastic bags at a rate of two per walk, or you attempt to pick up the second dump while keeping the first in the bag. A hard task, and one that I have little practice with. Max was never a double dumper, but he had his moments of a second poo on a walk or two (usually associated with some kind of GI distress), so I’m somewhat of a seasoned veteran (and I guess that seasoning would be shit).

I must share another weird thing Herbie does when he takes a shit: he backs his ass up against some object so close that the poo often smears down the wall (if it doesn’t have the right consistency…FWIW, Herbie’s first dump is usually quite firm and the second, well, not-so-much), or ends up on the bench of the picnic table. I’ve read my share of dog-behaviour books, but I don’t have an explanation for this one–perhaps Wolves do this sorta thing (which seems to be the ultimate explanation for every dog behaviour).

Katie and Lee also shared this theory with me about Herbie and the couch. The theory goes something like this: the dog isn’t allowed on the sofa without being invited up. This way the dog won’t go on the sofa without an invitation first. Agreed, a nice idea, but IMHO difficult to implement. That and I’ve never been one to care if a dog is or isn’t allowed on a sofa–Max is all over the furniture in Guelph. So, Heather got up early this morning and Herbie wasn’t in the bedroom. She snuck around the corner and the dog had slept on the sofa. Too funny. I think Herbie knew that he had been busted and made the move back to his bed, so when I woke up, it looked like he had spent the night there.

Inviting the dog up on the couch theory: 0, Herbie: 1.